


Blooming

by 911whatsgoinon



Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: Domestic Violence, F/M, Soulmate AU, Stabbing, general violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-29
Updated: 2020-05-29
Packaged: 2021-03-03 02:01:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24437089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/911whatsgoinon/pseuds/911whatsgoinon
Summary: An AU where flowers grow from where your soulmate bleeds.
Relationships: Maddie Buckley/Howie "Chimney" Han
Kudos: 25





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Cross-posted from tumblr with massive thanks from the Madney discord for helping me out ❤️

“Morning Cap!”

“Good morning Chim- oh hey look at that.”

Bobby leaned forwards, carefully plucking a tulip from Chimney’s eyebrow and handing it to him. Chimney sighed, tucking it into his locker, ready to be dried when he got home. 

“This is the thirteenth flower I’ve pulled this week.”

Buck popped his head into the locker room, frowning at Chim’s comment. 

“But it’s Monday?”

“Exactly.”

Buck puffed his cheeks out with a slight chuckle. 

“You must have the clumsiest soulmate ever.”

Buck left the room, leaving Bobby and Chimney, slightly somber. No words are exchanged, they know the alternative, something that someone as pure and innocent as Buck wouldn’t think of. He wouldn’t ever imagine it. 

Chimney returned home that night, heavy heart, swapping the six new flowers onto his drying rack, taking the browned flowers to put away in his shoebox. He didn’t really remember when the flowers started growing again, but he knew the first on had been right across his cheek, beautiful red roses erupting from his face like blood. Chimney knew what it meant. That’s when he began collecting them. 

Over three years, one thousand, five hundred and seventy four flowers, from roses to dandelions, tulips to chrysanthemums. All dried, tucked away in various boxes, hidden in his closet. There were many nights that he cried, wishing, praying, begging for the world to let him help, as flowers bloomed from where she bled. 

Out in the world, there was a woman. Alone, scared, in pain. Someone that Chimney wanted so badly to help, one that he couldn’t do anything to save, not now, not yet. 

Maybe not ever. 

He couldn’t think of that. 

Chimney knew one thing for sure.

One day, he would keep her safe in his arms, where the flowers would never bloom on his body ever again. 


	2. The Rebar Incident

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The rebar incident. That’s all.

At first Maddie had tried. She really had. She knew that flowers didn’t grow on his skin when she bled, she knew that just because it wasn’t the perfect match didn’t mean it couldn’t be a match. 

Oh how wrong she was. 

Nights passed where she cleaned her wounds, apologising in her head to the poor person who had to deal with all these flowers. Maybe he could give them to someone else, maybe he kept them, maybe he found them a mild annoyance.

But she couldn’t control where she bled, and almost every night came the same routine, clean herself up, clean the stains off the floor, the walls, anywhere they could be. Say sorry to the one receiving these flowers, forgive Doug and his usual apologies, and fall asleep exhausted. 

She hadn’t seen the flowers bloom on her in a very long time, and when they did, they were small, bluebells on her fingertips, lilies on her knees, little sprigs that she pulled and threw away, hoping Doug wouldn’t see. 

This one, this night, she couldn’t hide. The night had been a good one, as nights at home went, dinner was rather peaceful, everything was fine. Maddie let out a giggle, laugh dying in her throat as Doug’s eyes drifted upwards, face dropping as he slowly shook his head. 

“You were doing so well.”

Maddie raised a hand to her forehead, touching the dark red roses spilling from between her eyes. 

Bobby wouldn’t have normally been allowed into the operating room, that is, if flowers hadn’t kept growing over his head where they needed to operate. So that’s where he stood, dressed up in surgical scrubs, hovering around the edges, carefully plucking flower after flower as they grew. Carnations, orchids, daisies, the pile grew and grew as the surgery continued. Helpless to do anything else, Bobby prayed.

Maddie didn’t remember when Doug left her on the floor. She knew the flowers hadn’t stopped pouring from her head, she was still drowning in the beautiful blooms, but that worried her more. What sort of head injury had he received, to still be bleeding out? 

She wanted his suffering to end, for his pain to stop. 

But who was she to help with that, when she couldn’t escape from a nightmare of her own?


	3. Kidnapped

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Flight or flight, but with more flowers.

Maddie’s jumped as the doorbell buzzed, too lost in her thoughts to focus on the world. 

She tried not to live in fear, in a gated community, with three levels of security, all set up by the tech genius, Chimney. 

Chimney. She pressed the button to let him in, smoothing out her clothes for the millionth time, feeling the nerves rise up in her and forcing them back down again. 

After she made to LA, Buck got friends to help her move into her new place, Chimney and Eddie. Maddie immediately noticed the scar between Chimney’s eyes, and bugged Buck until he told her. It hadn’t taken too much to get him to tell her, but it hadn’t taken much for her to tell him all about drowning in roses from her head on the day Chimney went into surgery. 

She had begged him not to tell anyone, not for a while, so she could figure everything out. She had just run away from a long term abusive relationship, she wasn’t sure if she was ready to jump back to the dating scene. 

Now though, waiting for him to come pick her up, she had never been more ready in her life. 

That is, until she felt the flowers growing under her shirt. She whipped around, panic coursing through her veins as she moved to find Chimney, and whatever could be causing the dahlia’s bursting from her stomach. 

Instead she turned and walked straight into Doug. 

He found her. That was the only thought in her mind as she kicked and struggled, as he dragged her past a writhing Chimney, lying on the ground, shirt soaked in dark red, pink peonies blooming in the places she could feel blood trickling down her cheeks. 

The next hours were hell, sobbing silently in the car, watching the black petunia’s unfurl from her torso until Doug forcefully ripped them off. 

What was worse, was when the flowers stopped growing altogether. 

Buck crouched over Chimney’s hospital bed, watching the hyacinths grow from his cheeks, hoping Maddie would be alright. Right, what was he here for? He quickly connected Chim’s thumb to his phone, promptly being caught by Athena and whisked away. 

Bobby stayed. Watching the flowers bloom. Keeping track of, if what Buck had told him was true, Maddie’s injuries. 

The moment Chimney woke up, he saw the pile of purple flowers at the end of his bed, and felt a small tug on his arm. He winced, turning his head as best he good, catching a glimpse of Christoper as he tottered back to the end of the bed to carefully place the plucked lavender on the pile. She was alive.

If the flowers still grew, she was alive.

Maddie had to keep moving. Even now, she knew she left a trail of red in her wake, but she pushed on, stumbling through the snow in hopes of finding her way back. But hope was dwindling rapidly as her footsteps slowed, breathing becoming more laboured, eyelids dropping. 

She didn’t see the point in getting back. She’d saved herself, but only herself. How could she face everyone, knowing that her actions had gotten someone killed?

A slight twinge in her arm. One dandelion sprouted from her inner elbow, bright and cheery. 

New hope. 

She was going to make it. They were going to make it.


	4. Chimney’s Collection

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Where Maddie finds what Chimney really did with all those flowers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Implied smut (which is the only kind I do) at the end so watch it.

“Maddie? Maaadddiee?”

Chimney wandered his apartment, trying to find the love of his life, walking past his open bedroom and catching sight of a pile of his clothes on his bed. 

“Maddie, what are you do-”

The words died in his throat as she rounded the corner to see Maddie, huddled on the floor over something. 

“Mads?”

He rushed forwards gently placing a hand on her back as to not startle her, but she jumped anyways, revealing what she once covered. 

It was the box, well one of many, all hidden always in Chimney’s closet, the one she was clearing space from, presumably taking up his offer of some space. 

“These flowers…”

She picked up a dried flower, a hyacinth, from that night. 

“They’re mine?”

“Uh, yea. Yours.”

“How many?”

“Seven thousand, one hundred and fifty seven.”

The numbers came easily to Chimney, each already burned in his brain.

She forced the lump back down her throat, brushing her hand through the flowers. 

“Why?”

“I can get rid of them, y’know, if it’s hard for you.” Chimney was already hurrying for the closet, ready to throw out every single box of flowers. 

“No!” Maddie shook her head, softening her tone. “No, it, it’s alright. It’s sweet. And I guess your closet always smells nice.”

She let out a weak laugh, gently replacing the hyacinth and moving to shut the box. 

“I kept them as a reminder.”

Maddie turned her full attention to Chimney, who almost looked like he regretted starting his sentence, but he shook his head slightly and continued on. Why stop now?

“I kept them as a reminder that I failed you. I remember each and every flower because it’s another time I wasn’t able to save you, another time you got hurt and I couldn’t do anything.”

He reached for a smaller, more ornate box, tucked as far back as all the others, but this one only contained three flowers. 

“This one.” 

He picked out a rose, twisting it between his fingers. 

“This was the first. I don’t remember how many years ago it was, but it was the first.”

He tucked it into her hair by her right cheek, where he remembered the roses burst from his face. He picked up the second, a carnation.

“I wasn’t awake when this was pulled from my body. I believe it was the last one from the rebar incident. Uh, Bobby pulled it when I was in surgery. ”

Maddie didn’t need more to know what day that was. He tucked this one her belt hoop, where Bobby had told him this flower emerged from, before they stopped, for the rest of the surgery at least. He pulled out the third, a lavender. 

“This one,” Chimney looked down at the lavender, so small and insignificant to the outsider, but to him , “I woke up to Christopher gathering flowers for me. He pulled this from my arm, right beside my IV. It jostled the IV, which is why, when the nurses came back, they had to adjust it.”

He carefully tucked this one into the bottom of her sleeve.

“If what Buck told me was true, one flower grew because of it. You,” Chimney choked down his tears “You came back to me.”

Silent tears streamed down Maddie’s cheeks, not of sadness, for the first time in ages, she cried happy tears.

“You’re not the only one with flowers, although I only have one. And it’s not with me. But I think you know which one it is.”

Maddie was right, nothing else was added for Chimney to know the flower she spoke of was the dandelion, the one that brought her back to him. 

“And don’t think that, please, Howie, you could never fail me. These flowers, whatever you’re trying to remember them for are because of past mistakes. They’re in the past. We don’t have to think about those anymore.”

“Mhmm. C’mere.”

Chimney hums, pulling her close to his chest and falling backwards onto the bed. They enjoy a few moments of silence, before Maddie pipes up again. 

“How did you even fit that many flowers in shoeboxes in your closet?”

Chimney shrugged, leaning up to plant kisses along her cheek. 

“I’m a magician.”

“Oh sure you are.”

He chuckled, pressing his lips against hers, dropping his voice to a husky murmur.

“And for my next trick, I’m going to make your clothes disappear.”


End file.
